Public Access to Research

A number of institutions and funders require authors to retain the rights to post their accepted manuscripts, with a CC BY license, immediately upon acceptance. Fortunately, around 90% of ACS authors under these mandates have a simple and funded pathway to publish gold open access in ACS journals.

ACS Publications is providing an alternative option to support zero-embargo green open access and help authors adhere to the guidance of the 2022 White House Office of Science and Technology Policy “Nelson Memo”. This pathway expands the choices beyond the free 12-month embargo route for those authors who do not already benefit from a read and publish agreement. It enables them to comply with open access mandates by posting their accepted manuscript with a CC BY to a repository as soon as it is accepted for publication.

To ensure a sustainable means of covering the costs associated with the services provided from submission to final editorial decision, ACS Publications has introduced the article development charge (ADC). This includes organizing, developing, securing, and maintaining the high-quality scholarly peer review process and multiple other publishing services provided by a vast global network of editors and reviewers. This rigorous process guarantees that authors who publish with ACS Publications can remain confident their manuscripts have been accepted by the most trusted and prestigious journals in the field of chemistry.

While currently this pathway would only apply to a very small subset of authors, ACS Publications continues to explore options to help authors share their work widely and adhere to funders and institutions’ shifting mandates around immediate open access. As the industry moves beyond being solely focused on a subscription-based model, ACS Publications is exploring alternatives for how we sustain rigorous peer review while supporting open science.

More information about the ADC can be found here, and we encourage representatives from research funders to contact us to discuss how support for the ADC could be included in your future grants.